Breathing Moonrocks The Moon has plentiful oxygen for future astronauts

science.nasa.gov ^ | Dave Dooling

[Iam1ru1-2]

If you want to hear the article, go to:

Hear the article HERE

[Normal4me]

Gives a whole new meaning to go suck a rock don't it?

[Young Werther]

For decades there had been a solar furnace in the Pyrennes. It can focus the sun's rays and bring rectifying temperatures to the ore which it is exposed to.

O2 is 24% of the lunar regolith by weight. Cook the regolith and you have OXYGEN up the wazzoo!

Let's get on with it.

[Lurker]

Doesn't the moon lack sufficient gravity to hold an atmosphere of sufficient density for humans to breath? I could see this might be useful for making enough to fill some small domes or something, but it'll never produce a breathable atmosphere.

L

[Young Werther]

I worked for Praxair, which is a gass company. The fractionally distill the Earth's Atmosphere to produce PURE Oxygen, Nitrogen, CO2 and the noble gases. Given them the contract and they'll get the job done economically.

Of course, the Lunar Surface will present challenges but the Texas towers were gathering oil form 5000 feet in the '50s and now the sew spar technology is drilling for oil in mile deep water!!!

Good Old American Ingenuity!

[RightWhale]

The moon is 1/3 oxygen. This has been known for a while. What it is short of is hydrogen and carbon. Don't believe there will be domes on the moon, not widespread. There will be hollowed-out caverns. They will dig, and they will have to import some comets.

[muir_redwoods]

I wonder if any significant portion of the Martian surface is made up of oxides that could be rendered similarly. It would be wonderful to set up a few thousand solar furnaces (aware as I am of the distance from the sun)and begin turning oxygen loose on Mars.

[RightWhale]

Yes, Mars also has water and carbon. It looks like a better place to live, but that might be an illusion.

[Liberal Classic]

Interesting article. I think these researchers are barking up the right tree, but they need to consider more uses of this slag than just radiation shielding. On earth, slag is used (among other things) in the production of fertilizer. Any sustained human habitation of the moon is going to need grow food.

The article mentions silicon, calcuim, iron, and magnesium oxides, but lunar soil is generally believed to be similar in composition to that of the earth. After nitrogen, potassium and phosphorous, the three next most important plant nutrients are calcuim, magnesium, and sulphur. Plants also need trace amounts of other minerals. The moon is rich in all these elements, except for nitrogen.

This is interesting work, and I wish them well. For a follow on project, they should explore the possibility of separating the elements and purifying the slag into silicon for glass, magnesium and iron for construction, and other elements for fertilizers.

[Solamente]

What about nitrogen?

[RightWhale]

I forgot to mention nitrogen. That will have to be imported also, and that is a problem. Earth is a nitrogen planet, which makes bomb-making and agriculture relatively easy.

[Liberal Classic]

I think we're going to need to bring our own sources of carbon and nitrogen. I'm not sure the lunar soil contains significant amounts of those elements.

[coloradan]

Water is 89% oxygen by weight. It would be as easy or more easy to extract the oxygen from water as it would be from those rocks. Electrolysis, for example. And you don't have to go to great lengths to melt the water, first, like you do with the rocks.

[RightWhale]

There is no water proven to be on the moon. Zero.

[SC Swamp Fox]

Tech ping.

[SC Swamp Fox]

I used to work for a company called Union Carbide. They used to sell O2/N2 plants to companies like Praxair.

Give them the contract.

[Calvin Locke]

I thought the Moon lacks sufficient gravity to avoid health problems for human beings? Automation will have to be
included in the equation.

[Liberal Classic]

I guess we could send a few ships full of amonia, at least until our hydroponic technology is good enough to sustain a nitrogen cycle. That would be one stinky spaceship. ;)

[coloradan]

I didn't say there was. What I said was, it would be as easy to get oxygen from water as from these rocks, and it's a big hassle to get it from water. Ergo, it's a pretty big hassle to get it from rocks (which are located on the moon) too. It's not like the lunar oxygen problem is "solved" - 2500 degrees is pretty hot, and it would take an awfully big furnace an awfully long time to get a community's worth of oxygen.

[Squawk 8888]

The biggest obstacle is the low gravity and consequent low pressure. The Martian atmosphere would have to consist of almost-pure oxygen to be breathable.